SNMP is a set of network management protocols based on Simple Gateway Monitor Protocol (SGMP) defined by The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). By means of SNMP, a management station can remotely manage all network devices that support the protocol, including monitoring a network state, amending network device configuration, receiving a network event alarm, etc. SNMP adopts a special form of Client/Server mode, i.e., proxy/station mode, and the management and maintenance of the network is carried out through interaction between an SNMP management station and an SNMP proxy. Each SNMP proxy is responsible for responding to various queries and settings of the SNMP management station about Management Information Base (MIB) definition information, and initiatively reporting events such as alarms etc. to the SNMP management station in a manner of trap.
The current process for interacting messages between an SNMP management station and an SNMP proxy is as shown in FIG. 1. The SNMP management station sends an SNMP message, such as Get, Get-Next, Get-Bulk, Set request and so on, to the SNMP proxy, and the SNMP proxy implements internal processing after receiving the request and returns a response to the SNMP management station. When sending the request to the SNMP proxy, the SNMP management station will set a certain timeout period for processing this request so as to prevent the SNMP management station from being always blocked in a response receiving state when the SNMP proxy is unable to return a response due to occurrence of abnormity. The SNMP management station waits for the response returned by the SNMP proxy before timeout, and the system recover to the normal state after timeout, and meanwhile the interface outputs a timeout result. The timeout period of the SNMP management station is generally a default value, and may also be manually set.
The time for processing data for different managed devices is different, and the time for processing different requests for the same managed device is also different. Especially in a telecommunication network device, due to the large amount of data, the time for processing query and setting requests is relatively longer and often exceeds the timeout period set by the SNMP management station. Multiple times of timeout may cause a series of problems: 1) the SNMP management station is unable to obtain the desired data or is unable to acquire the setting result for the managed device; 2) the administrator may execute query or configuration operation once again immediately after the SNMP management station timing out, but the SNMP management station is still processing the previous message, and thus the processing load of the SNMP proxy is increased.
To solve the above problem of timeout, one method is to manually adjust the timeout period at the SNMP management station. However, generally, the administrator is impossible to completely know all devices and the time for the devices to process different requests, therefore, there is a big limitation if the timeout period is determined by an administrator. If the set timeout period is too short, the above timeout event is apt to occur; while if the set timeout period is too long, then the efficiency of the administrator's operation will be greatly affected and time will be wasted when the response is unable to be returned due to abnormality occurs during the process of the SNMP proxy processing the request.